


Personal Sassistants

by polarising



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Frenemies, Gen, Neutral Pacifist Ending, One-Sided Attraction, Post-Neutral Route (Undertale), Rivalry, also there's very one-sided soriel for the sake of it, but it won't be talked abt much, i.e. my favourite mettasans concept, the papyton is just one-sided flirting atm but if i get around to continuing it might develop idk, this is basically just sans and mettaton constantly trying to one-up each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-11
Updated: 2015-12-11
Packaged: 2018-05-06 04:59:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,686
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5403950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/polarising/pseuds/polarising
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Mettaton recruits the local skeleton brothers to be his personal assistants, he doesn't consider that Sans having access to all of the robot's appointments, files, and generally important information may turn out a lot worse than expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Personal Sassistants

**Author's Note:**

> this wasn't supposed to be like 4.5k words long but oh well
> 
> also fuck this title

 

It wasn't that his previous assistant was necessarily bad at his job - most of the time he provided a perfectly adequate service for the amount of gold he was being paid (which, admittedly, wasn't much), and Mettaton might have even have gone as far to say that he sometimes went above and beyond the call of duty.

But if there was one thing he couldn't stand, it was being handed decaffeinated coffee right before a performance. His charging ports were always reliable, and he made sure to get as much beauty "sleep" as Alphys had recommended, but sometimes he just felt worn out and even tired, and his pre-show coffee always managed to perk him right up, even if it was just for the duration of his time on camera.

 Decaf coffee doesn't cut it. It's caffeine or nothing.

 As he lies alone in his apartment, surrounded by pink fluffy throw pillows on his chaise lounge and a cream faux fur blanket draped over his hips, he can't help but think that  _maybe_  his reasons for firing his assistant had been a little...flawed. That was probably the small monster's dream job - who wouldn't love to be working at Mettaton's side 24/7? - and he had been let go due to one minor discrepancy. That's gotta suck.

 On the contrary, he should have known better. After all, Mettaton is a  _star,_ and you just don't rock up with only decaf coffee to hand and expect him to be pleased with it.

 He tilts his head back over the back of the armrest, and stretches one perfectly toned leg out, sighing. It's not like he couldn't find someone else to replace him. Thousands of monsters would jump at the chance to work alongside him. Hell, he could even consider some of his fans as practically slaves; he'd lost count of the amount of times he'd been cornered after shows and offered anything their little hearts could think of. Propositioning him seemed like their usual method of choice, though. Obviously.

His pink bejeweled smartphone buzzes on the side table, and he groans in irritation before clicking his chest dial around to answer it. His manager's voice crackles through his speaker while he absentmindedly picks at the leather of the lounge with a perfectly manicured fuchsia nail.

 "Hello? Hello? You can hear me, right? Right, anyway, I took care of your paperwork this morning. Your assistant has now  _officially_  been fired, since I know you love to do it yourself but prefer to know that it's all in the books." His voice is gruff and smug-sounding, and Mettaton sighs loudly before turning the volume down.

 "Good! Thank you for phoning to tell me. You're made my morning, darling," he says, not making a conscious effort to hide the sarcasm in his voice.

 "It's an honour, sir," the manager replies, sounding cheerier and clearly not noticing the star's insincerity. Mettaton rolls his eyes at nothing in particular. He really needed his morning coffee right about now. The lack of fuel in his system was already taking its toll, and he is especially thankful to Alphys that he doesn't have to drink gasoline or oil to keep himself powered and instead can sip delicately on  _non-decaf_  coffee while being plugged into the nearest wall socket. "A-and! And, I guess I have to tell you that you need to find a new assistant soon. Don't take this the wrong way, Mr. MTT sir, but you're almost incapable of doing everything yourself."

"I'm doing just fine right now, thank you very much."

"Yes, but that's because you've only been without an assistant for nine hours, maybe, and that's while you were charging. Need I remind you of the time that-" -He booked a hotel in the hotel owner's name and sent the staff crazy upon arrival? The time that he missed three performances due to him running out of eyeliner? The time that he refused to attend a fan meet-'n-greet due to the fact that they couldn't book the whole room for him, just half of it? The time that- "-you were a whole thirty minutes late to your dress rehearsal after oversleeping?" Oh. Well, it could've been worse.

"Sure I do. That's not so bad."

"And the time that-"

"Yes, okay, I get it. That's enough. I'll scout around for a new assistant as soon as I can. After all, who would refuse being latched to my gorgeous hip all day, every day?"

 

\---

 

Not only had he found one assistant by noon, he'd found  _two_  actual willing workers, and without needing to use threats of violence or disappearance.

The two lucky (or unlucky, depending on how you look at it. Naturally, Mettaton would consider them very lucky) guys in question were Sans and Papyrus, skeleton brothers from Snowdin. They'd spoken before, and Mettaton would probably consider them friends already. Papyrus was all too eager to take the job; Sans, not being on the greatest of terms with the robot, somewhat reluctantly accepted, admitting privately that he "only took it to look out for his brother". 

He agreed to meet the two of them outside his hotel at 3PM sharp, and then phoned them at 2.30PM to ask why they weren't there yet.

"Don't you know it's rude to keep a star waiting?" he scolded, seething into the receiver.

"Yes! Of course! We're sorry, Mettaton!" came the scratchy reply, followed by shuffling as the phone was passed along. In the background rang Papyrus' cries of despair and failure, and then Sans, through the phone: "chill out, dude. We'll get there when we get there, alright?". Then he hung up.

To go against Mettaton's word was a crime in itself. To hang up on him was ten times  _worse._

They still hadn't shown up, and he wonders if they've taken their time out of spite. He keeps his bitter expression on his face, irritably tapping the toe of his boot against the ground as he spots two white figures in the distance. The familiar red boots of one scuff against the red clay path as they approach.

"You two really aren't impressing me thus far. You do know I could fire you at any time, right? And you're not even on the job yet, darlings," Mettaton hisses, snapping his gloved fingers at 'any'. "There's nothing stopping me from sending you home right now with no pay and bad reputations."

"Except the fact that, without us, you'll probably miss all your shows and disappoint your oh-so-adoring fans," Sans quips, looking him in the eye. The robot doesn't flinch. "Am I wrong?"

"I never admit when people are right, love," he leans down at the waist to look the shorter skeleton directly in the eye at face level, "and  _you_  are  _certainly_  no exception."

Sans sticks a blue tongue out at him, and Mettaton recoils at the proximity of it, instead pushing a neatly folded piece of paper towards him and standing back upright. Papyrus takes the paper quickly after his brother just stares at it and then back at Mettaton. "If you're trying to intimidate me, it's not working. Now, I've prepared a list of my upcoming performances, shows, and featurettes that span from now until the end of the month. I want you two to phone up my crew to make sure they're aware of every single one of these events, and I want them ordered by time and date, and also alphabetised."

Papyrus' face looks racked with panic, while Sans still casts him an amused look. "Alphabetised- Mettaton, come on. You don't need them  _alphabetised._ "

"I also don't need to take orders from someone with disgusting condiment stains on their shirt, yet here we are."

"So you admit, you're taking my orders?"

" _So you admit_ , you're disgusting?"

"Ah, ah, ah." Sans throws him a wink, and the bitter expression on Mettaton's face fades for a moment before being replaced with a scowl at the realisation of his mistake. "You only said the stain was-"

"I know what I said. Don't correct me, darling. Alphabetise them or you're getting fired and banished from the underground. Oh, and also possibly slapped! Catch me in a different mood, lovely, and we'll see how I feel about that. I wouldn't want to dirty my gloves without good reason."

Papyrus looks from his brother to his new boss and back again. "Sans, I- I really think you should just listen to him. An opportunity like this should not be passed up!"

The smaller skeleton just shrugs in response. "Sure. You're right, Paps. I wouldn't dream of letting an opportunity like  _this_  slide by."

Something in the 'this' doesn't sit right with Mettaton, but he plasters a smug grin on his face regardless. "Good! I just knew you'd give up your tiring, ridiculous little 'holier-than-thou' act soon enough. I'm very good at getting people to do what I want, in case you hadn't noticed; that's why  _I'm_  the one with the underground eating from the palm of my hand, and not you."

"Excuse me, Mettaton, sir!" Papyrus says, interrupting the glare exchange happening between the two. "What will you be doing while we're sorting out your, uh, affairs? What will we do if we need to clarify something?"

"My private number's on the paper, sweetheart. Call me any time," he says cheerily, making an attempt to feign happiness towards the more naïve of the two. "I'll just be rehearsing. And by rehearsing, I obviously mean dancing fabulously to my own songs in my apartment. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm a little late, darling." Papyrus splutters at the nickname, despite it being used for pretty much anyone Mettaton talks to; it's more the principle that it's aimed directly at him, if anything. "Toodles!"

The brothers watch the star's dramatic exit, involving a practiced-and-perfected strut and at least two other monsters' jaws going slack at the mere sight of him, and once he'd gotten far, far away from them, Sans turned to Papyrus with a glimmer of satisfaction in his eyes.

"We got the job, bro. Now hand me that list. We have some dates to rearrange."

 

\---

 

Mettaton's rehearsal comment wasn't exactly a lie, even though it was just the first thing that came to mind. It wasn't his original plan for the afternoon, but hey, he did actually need to practice for his next show, and what better way to procrastinate than to dance?

He's not sure why his neighbours below him haven't complained about the near-constant  _click-click-click_  of his heeled boots on floorboard, but he guesses that they don't want to cause trouble with the underground's biggest star, or that they're just too awestruck to try and make conversation whenever they see him. Every morning, he walks past his bedroom door and sees the note on the door with "buy carpet!" loopily written on, and every evening, he comes home without a carpet. Fate just really doesn't want him to have that fuzzy fuchsia rug he'd been eyeing up in the boutique at the mall.

He stops putting so much effort into dancing for a second to take a look around his apartment. It always felt empty, despite being filled with tasteful furniture, and it always felt cold, although that may have more to do with the fact that metal gets cold easily over anything else. 

For a brief moment he considers inviting his two new assistants round so that he can keep an eye on exactly what they were doing, but dismisses the idea for the simple reason that he knows Sans would most likely purposely try to destroy his apartment out of spite. Come to think of it, he's not sure why they aren't on good terms; after all, he hadn't done anything wrong or spiteful towards him. He puts it down to clashing personalities - loud, extravagant and arrogant versus sarky and somewhat reserved. His pick-up lines aimed at Papyrus probably don't go down too well, either.

He dramatically flops down onto the chaise lounge, sighing, and taps at his phone. One hundred and forty seven Sur-Facebook notifications (if humans could use it, why couldn't he?) and seventy unopened emails. By coincidence, it vibrates in his hands, startling him, and it displays an "unknown caller" ID. He reluctantly swipes to answer it and immediately starts talking.

"Hi, darling, you've reached the one and only Mettaton. I'm afraid I can't make it to the phone right now, so please leave a message after the tone!"

"Bull _shit_ , buddy, it didn't even ring once."

 "Ah. Sans. It's you," he replies disdainfully. "What is it?"

"We're done," Sans says.

"Already?"

"Yup."

At the other end of the phone, in a small house in Snowdin, Papyrus scans the list again and opens his mouth as if to point out something. Sans holds up a hand to stop him as the robotic voice crackles through the speaker. "Are you certain that you've gone through everyone?"

"As sure as my jacket is blue."

"For all I know, you could be wearing a different  _red_  jacket right now, you smart little fu-" A series of beeps and static censor out what presumably wouldn't be fit for the robot's usual family-friendly TV shows. Sans laughs. Clearly Alphys didn't think about how well that sensor would translate to off-stage situations.

"Man, you really gotta have more faith in your assistants. We're here for a reason, y'know?"

"I only offered the job to your brother, darling. You were just...extra baggage."

"Maybe you should think twice before flirting with him next time, then." Papyrus' head snaps upward from looking down at the paper he was doodling on to shoot a look of desperation at Sans.

"That's simply my programming. I can't help that I'm just irresistibly attractive." Sans rolls his pupils. "Uh, anyway, I'll get another job to you soon enough."

The skeleton revels in the awkward silence between the two, enjoying wearing his frenemy down. "Cools. Oh, yeah, hope you didn't show up  _too_  late to your own date, kid. I'd hate for ya to have missed out on givin' yourself bedroom eyes in the mirror." Sans can hear the fans whirring from the other end of the phone. Whether it was from embarrassment, anger, or something else, he doesn't know, but he's glad that his comment struck a nerve. "See ya later, then, ro-boss."

Mettaton hangs up without so much as a goodbye, and Papyrus looks somewhat scared. "B-but Sans, you-  _we_  didn't sort out  _any_  of what was on that list!"

"Sure we did."

"You cancelled every single one of them and then told a stupid knock-knock joke to his manager!" Sans shrugs in response. "Sans, we're going to be fired.  _Fired!_  Can you not just put aside your lousy rivalry for the sake of our new job?"

"The guy deserves it."

"For what? Just think of how popular we could be with this job! Monsters will recognise us! We'll have hundreds- no,  _thousands_  of friends! Why are you trying so hard to just annoy him? You're throwing away a completely adequate opportunity!"

Sans rests a hand on his brother's shoulder. "Look. I  _mostly_  have no problems with the guy, and I don't have any problems with people who do adore him. Whatever floats your  _bot_ ," he says with a wink. Papyrus narrows his eyes at the badly-executed pun. "I just think it'd be funny as hell to see him trip up, ya know? Trust me on this one, bro, I know what I'm doing."

"I sincerely hope you do! Because!  _I_  don't! And while I would like to know, I would much rather not get on the wrong side of my idol!" 

"I'm not scared of him," Sans says, with an air of finality. "He'll get his just desserts. Speaking of desserts, all that work has  _tire_ -d me out. You know, 'cause Mettaton used to have a wheel? No? I thought that one would tickle your funny bone. Anyway, wanna go to Grillby's?"

 

\---

 

Perfectly manicured pink nails tap against the wooden counter of the cooking show set, and Mettaton leans his elbow on the counter and rests his chin in his palm. Not one crew member is here. Not  _one_.

He'd fire them all if he had replacements for them...which he doesn't, so he bitterly dismisses the idea. The overhead stage lights flicker and the fridge starts to whirr almost mockingly. The pre-prepared cookies underneath the counter would have to wait. How could he host a show with nobody here to film it?

He sets his phone down on the counter, the jewelled case rocking with every touch, and prods at the screen. As soon as he'd dialled the number, he set it to loudspeaker.

"Sans."

"Hey, Mettaton. What can I do for ya?"

"You can start by telling me why the hell none of my crew members are here."

"Strike?" Sans suggests.

The robot considers his response options, deliberating between yelling at him (which would just make him more smug) or play it cool. While the former is more appealing, he'd have to settle for pretending he doesn't want to throttle him, for the sake of his ratings. "Come, now,  _darling_ , I'm sure you know the  _real_  reason."

Sans pauses, the emphasis on 'darling' making him uncomfortable. "Uh, nope. Sorry. We're just your lowly assistants."

"You wouldn't happen to have oh-so-helpfully rescheduled my times, would you?" Mettaton's counter tapping becomes more forceful and loud enough to be heard by the two on the other end of the phone. There's no immediate response from the skeleton. "I know you were trying to be a dear and help me out, but it simply isn't your job!"

"...You're taking this well."

"I am indeed taking it remarkably well. But it's not your fault, sweetheart. We all mess up now and then. Excluding me, of course. So, like any decent boss, I'm giving you another chance." More silence, except this time Sans wasn't the one enjoying it. "Come to my talk show studio tomorrow, honey. We'll talk through some things and see what we can do about this."

Sans hangs up without another word, not remembering that red-buttoning Mettaton is The Worst Thing to do. Said robot sighs over-dramatically on the other end of the now-dead line.

 A trip to Dr. Alphys' laboratory was in order, it seemed.

 

\---

 

"Mettat-ton, you were made to entertain and love yourself and your fans. Not to show up some...sassy skeleton on live TV."

" _Alphys,_ " he whines, drawing out the 'y' a little too long. "Darling."

"No!"

The robot and the scientist's relationship is akin to that of a cat and its owner; Mettaton is nearly constantly hanging around the lab in his spare time or before performances, examining everything that he's probably already seen a hundred times before and leaning over Alphys' shoulder while she typed up new research (or fanfiction, it seemed. He'd noticed quite a few new 'kissy cutie girls stuff DO NOT OPEN!!!!!"-esque documents popping up on her desktop while looking for new self-published scandals) and she always very reluctantly gave him the attention. She didn't quite know why herself, because he gets enough of it onstage.

She pushes away from her desk on her wheeled office chair and spins around to face him as he perches on the edge of her desk, letting his legs swing. "Don't get bitter again. I didn't build you to always try to one-up people that piss you off." She pauses, lifting a claw to her chin. "Then again, I  _also_  didn't build you to single-handedly seduce most of the underground, but that hasn't stopped you."

He winks. "Ohh, you can bet your lil' scales it hasn't, sweetheart."

"Moving on," she says quickly, trying to avoid discussing that particularly awkward topic with him.

"Do my  _lavish_  descriptions of backstage encounters-"

"No. Stop. You can't sexualise a robot."

A buzzer sounds from Mettaton's chest plate, recognising a wrong answer. Another function built for TV that doesn't fare well with off-stage talks. "Incorrect, my dear."

"W-whatever. Anyway, I really don't think you should try to humiliate Sans like that, and especially not on TV," Alphys says. "He's a good guy."

"You obviously don't see the side of him that I do," he hisses, feeling static build up in anger.

"Obviously I don't. H-he must really hate you, Metta."

"Yes, alright, don't rub it in."

"What did you  _do_ ?" she asks, leaning in as if they were sharing secrets at a sleepover. Not that they didn't do that often. Their slumber parties often consisted of too many caffeinated drinks for Alphys to handle ("That's only your third can? Oh,  _sweetheart_ ." "Shut it, ro-butt. Just b-because you can sit there chugging coffee and sports drink without any effects doesn't mean we all can." "Three cans is just  _weak_ , though.") and Mettaton drearily being subjected to hours of the same few Mew Mew Kissy Cutie episodes. He would never be able to remove the theme song from his internal memory. He'd take that stupid sparkling and high-pitching singing to the  _grave_.

" _Nothing_ ! ...At least, I don't think so. Nothing  _wrong_ , anyway," he says offhandedly. He nudges her chair with the toe of his boot, sending it whirling around. She catches herself on the desk, stopping the spinning to glare at him, and he chuckles. Not a normal, showy kind of laugh, but just a subdued half-giggle. Alphys would find it incredibly endearing if she wasn't annoyed at him for spinning her chair around.

"Hmph. Well, you should know what annoyed Sans enough to make him cancel all your shows. I-"

"I flirted with Papyrus, that's all."

"You...just  _flirted_  with him? Wow. That's pretty tame, Metta. I'm almost proud."

"My point exactly, darling. I flirt with everyone. That's my thing! Sans is just...overprotective of his brother, it seems." He pauses. It still doesn't make that much sense - Sans being annoyed at him for using a pick-up line or two, while Papyrus stood there blushing and gawping at his idol, clearly enjoying it? Not enough reason to hate him. "Anyways, can you  _please_  sort out the phone-hacking-database-thingy for me? Pretty please?" He bats his eyelashes.

"...I don't know, it's a lot of work. C-can't you just find some other way to do it-"

"I'll pay you," he offers, picking his phone up from the desk and unlocking it. "You wanted that limited edition Kissy Cutie figurine, right?"

"Mettaton, d-don't you dare-"

"Ah, ah, ah. Shhh." He hushes her as his fingers move almost too fast over the keypad. Alphys taps her foot against the wheels of the chair, wanting to protest but also longing for the figurine deep down. "And now you have it," he says smugly, tapping the screen. It ping'ed in confirmation of his order. "So now that means you  _have_  to help me, my lovely!"

Alphys doesn't particularly like this recent trend of bribing her with anime merchandise, but she falls for it every time.

 

\---

 

The show begins how every other one of Mettaton's shows does: with a loud "ohhhhhhhhhhh, yes!" as the spotlight is cast down on him and an uproar of applause from the audience. Nobody seems to notice how his smile is just that little bit more wide, how his eyes have more of a glint than usual.

"Hello, beauties, gentlebeauties, and all other  _wonderful_  configurations in between, and welcome to the underground's most  _fabulous_  talk show!" His legs are draped over one armrest of the hot pink seat, with his back leaning against the other and his arm resting across the top. He kicks one boot out at 'fabulous'. "And I have a very special episode for you today, my darlings!"

Everyone in the audience cheers and squeals excitedly - except for one. Sans tilts his head back on his seat and groans. "Can't believe we have to sit through this just to talk to him at the end. He's gonna be swarmed by fans too, Paps. We're gonna be here for hours."

"I, for one, do not mind waiting for Mettaton!"

"Yeah, well, you wouldn't."

The screen behind Mettaton's seat flashes before displaying the show's logo. "Today we've got a topic I think you'll all enjoy. Now, I know it's not my usual kind of content, and I promise, I'll make it up to you," the host himself says with a wink, knowing full well that every single audience member would think (or hope) it was directed at them, "but fear not, you won't be disappointed with what I have for you!"

He continued. "Some of you may be aware that I have new assistants. I know you all love to stalk me and find out all of my juicy private life details. But I have a feeling a lot of you know who they are anyway, because, well, who doesn't? Anyways, they're here, obviously, and they're going to... _help me out_  with the show tonight! Sans, Papyrus, come on down, darlings!"

Sans sits up, not expecting to be acknowledged, and Papryus looks at him, slack-jawed. "After this, we're resigning, buddy," Sans mutters as they awkwardly sidle across the legs of the other audience members.

"Why?" Papyrus whispers.

"Because somethin' tells me this isn't part of the usual job description."

The two make their way down the set of aisle steps and to the side of the stage, nervously stumbling up into view of the cameras. Mettaton impatiently drums his fingers against the back of the chair. "We haven't got all day," he mutters through gritted teeth.

Sans sits himself down in one of the extra seats and glares at the robot. "Maybe we'd be a lot faster if we knew what the hell is going on."

"Now that we have our very special volunteers on stage, we can get to the  _real_  nitty gritty." The shorter skeleton looks from the audience to his brother, who is absentmindedly messing with his neck cape whilst avoiding eye contact with anyone. "The do's and don't of dating! Well, the texting part of it, anyway. Of course, none of this would be possible without the _lovely_  Sans graciously allowing me access to all of his text messages! Assistant's perks, you see; you get to have the world's best at flirting - that's me, lovelies - make sure that you're doing the right thing!"

Sans is frozen, unable to quite process that Mettaton,  _the_  Mettaton, has read every text message he's ever sent. And he just  _knows_  that the ones he's picked out are the flirtatious ones to Toriel. Not that she was ever that interested, but hey, he's allowed to make subtle comments and punny pick-up lines every once in a while, right? Once in a while meaning every four texts, but whatever.  _Whatever_.

His dislike for him had quickly grown into hate within the last two minutes or so, and he agonisingly slowly turns his head to face the robot, who's giving him a sickly sweet yet sardonic smile. "And it's such a shame I didn't get to proof-read these before you sent them.  _Such a shame,_ because if I had, maybe I could've stopped you from embarrassing yourself now, my lovely."

At this point, a Bad Time almost certainly awaits Mettaton in the future. Sans swears under his breath, and Mettaton gasps dramatically.

"My, my. This is a family-friendly TV show, darling, we can't have that kind of language here!" he says. "Although maybe I'll have to allow it. We couldn't show your texts otherwise!" He glances at the audience, then back at Sans. "Sweetheart, you should be  _immensely flattered_  that I'm making exceptions. And for  _you_ , of all people. Go on, have at it. Let something out!"

Biting back a flurry of rather bitter comments, Sans just casts him a pupil-less stare. He's not going to give that robot the satisfaction. 

"Ah, about what I expected. You wouldn't want to make yourself even more memorable, would you? So, without further ado..." He flashes a wink at Sans as a pale blue blush (could it even be called that?) flushes over the latter's skull. "...it's showtime!"

 

**Author's Note:**

> tumblr: polarise.co.vu
> 
> first undertale work! so comments appreciated n all, i'd like to know if you guys actually want to see this continued
> 
> but pls don't feel pressured to leave one omg i just hope you like it


End file.
